How do I remove adhesive left behind by old ceiling tiles.
The only way is by hard work with sandpaper or a sander. If these were old tiles, they will have been applied with a special cement adhesive that will not melt with a wallpaper stripper – only more recent wallpaper adhesives have been strong enough to adhere polystyrene tiles which I suspect your tiles were. Alternatively, you could cover the marks with a fresh skim of plaster. We’ve encountered this problem several times and now if the tiles are in good condition, we leave them and paint over them as neither of us smoke, we don’t use naked flame heaters so they are not a hazard except in kitchens.
